Tonight, your local PBS affiliate will be airing the Kennedy Center special honoring David Letterman with the 20th Annual Mark Twain Prize for Humor. You’ll see comedy stars like Jimmy Kimmel, Norm Macdonald, Bill Murray, Amy Schumer, John Mulaney, and more fete the late night titan with speeches in his honor. What you won’t see is what embattled Senator Al Franken had to say. The former Saturday Night Live writer and performer’s tribute was cut from the broadcast in the wake of the allegations that he conducted sexual misconduct. Decider received an advance press screener of the event that still included Franken’s segment. So what did you miss?

After a Martin Short musical number enumerating Letterman’s various “big” contributions to the late night genre, Senator Franken was going to be introduced as “a man who was just crowned Mr. Deep State 2017,” before welcoming his comedy friends to Washington, DC and launching into his speech:

“Do not for one minute think that what you do is any less important than what I do here in Washington even though it is. Now, many of you associate me with the fifteen seasons I did at Saturday Night Live. Some seasons were better than others and the 1985-1986 season was not one of our best. And I was one of the producers so I got a call from the TV critic at The Philadelphia Inquirer and she says to me, ‘Why doesn’t Saturday Night Live do risky material like the Letterman show?’ So I ask her if she could give me an example of something that David was doing on his show that was risky. You know, comedically risky, which was what she was asking. And she said, ‘The monkey-cam.’ Now just to refresh your memory, here’s a little clip of the monkey-cam.”

The special cuts to an edited clip of the classic Letterman bit. For context, some of the footage from this YouTube video made it into the short sizzle reel:

Franken continued:

“Now, I told the critic there is nothing risky about the monkey-cam. It’s hilarious. It’s brilliant. It’s not risky. If you put a chimp out there, on the stage, with a camera on its head, and cut to that point of view, you’re going to get laughs! This was a sure thing. This was comedy gold. It was also a perfect example of what made David’s show so ground-breaking, so surreal. David was the innovator who changed late night forever. He hosted his show for 33 years, making him the longest-serving late night host in history.”

“And since retiring from his show, he has been enjoying himself and his family, and doing a project here and there on issues that mean something to him like the existential threat of climate change – something that’s been a focus of mine in the Senate. I mean I have three grandchildren and I don’t want them fifty years from now saying to me, ‘Grandpa, you were a United States Senator, you knew climate change was happening. Why didn’t you do anything? And also, why are you still alive?’ Because I will be 116.”

“Anyway, that’s why Dave and I put out a few web videos on the subject. I think this demonstrated David’s range from monkey-cam to climate change, please take a look.”

Franken then introduces a short excerpt from his Funny or Die web series, “Boiling The Frog.” You can watch all the episodes here. The specific clip shown came from Episode 6, “Can A Beard Save The Planet?” It features Letterman in Franken’s Senate office where a doctor takes a sample of Letterman’s beard to see its affect as a carbon sink. “Will there be any disrobing required?” Letterman quips. “No, we’re just going to take a little bit.” You can watch the whole clip below:

And that’s what Senator Al Franken was going to do and say in honor of Letterman’s Mark Twain Prize.